11th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art

The Berlin Biennale is one the most important showcases of contemporary art in the world and the only one of its kind in Germany. Every two years, renowned curators provide a stage for new, lesser-established works of recent contemporary art.

The Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art takes place at varying locations in Berlin every two years and features diverse concepts by its curators. The event promotes experimental formats and offers curators the freedom to present the boldest and most relevant positions of contemporary art, independent of the interests of the art market or art collections.

The 11th Berlin Biennale

Since September 2019, the Biennale has been unfolding in a temporary project space in Berlin. Its presentations, performances and workshops dealt with themes such as solidarity, fragility and resistance - themes that take on a new meaning today in light of the pandemic and the social inequalities it continues to expose. From September 5, the upcoming exhibition, the epilogue, will bring together in four locations these experiences and the issues they raise.

The curators of the 11th Berlin Biennale

The selection committee of the Berlin Biennale has selected María Berríos, Renata Cervetto, Lisette Lagnado and Agustín Pérez Rubio to serve as the curators of the 11th Berlin Biennale.

• María Berríos (*1978, Santiago de Chile) is a sociologist, author, freelance curator and co-founder of the Chilean artists’ collective vaticanochico. She is particularly interested in the social experiments of the Third World movement and the exhibition formats which it spawned in the 1960s and 1970s.
• Renata Cervetto (*1985, Buenos Aires) studies and applies artistic practices in connection with language, public space and physical memory. She has researched the pedagogical programmes of the biennial festivals in Mercosul and São Paulo and has investigated to what extent performance can assume the character of critical expression.
• Lisette Lagnado (*1961, Kinshasa) is a researcher, art critic and independent curator. She is interested in applying strategies of collaboration with sociologists and architects in public space.
• Agustín Pérez Rubio (*1972, Valencia) is known for his collaborative curatorial and institutional projects which tie into gender issues, feminist themes, linguistics, architecture, politics and postcolonial perspectives.

The Berlin Biennale is organised by KUNST-WERKE BERLIN e.V.

The Federal Cultural Foundation began supporting the Berlin Biennale in 2006 after designating the festival as one of Germany’s “Cultural Institutions of Excellence”. With the allocation of three million euros in funding, the Federal Cultural Foundation continues its long-term partnership as the leading sponsor of the 11th edition of the Berlin Biennale in 2019.